Lower back pain and its association with whole-body vibration and manual materials handling among commercial drivers in Sabah

A cross-sectional study was undertaken to determine the prevalence of lower back pain (LBP) and its association with whole-body vibration (WBV) and manual materials handling (MMH). We studied 110 commercial vehicle drivers using a self-administered questionnaire and the VI-400Pro human vibration monitor. Prevalence of LBP was 66.4%. The percentage of drivers who had frequent manual handling of heavy loads was 45.5% and those who handled heavy loads in awkward postures accounted for 86.4%. Daily vibration A(8) averaged on the z axis was 0.25 (0.06) m·s−2 and at vector sum was 0.29 (0.07) m·s−2. Daily vibration exposures on the z axis, frequent manual handling of heavy loads and awkward posture during MMH were significantly associated with LBP. Drivers who are exposed to WBV and frequently handle heavy loads manually and with awkward postures probably have more LBP than drivers who are exposed to only one of these risk factors

Ergonomic risk factors of work processes in the semiconductor industry in Peninsular Malaysia

A cross-sectional survey of semiconductor factories was conducted to identify the ergonomic risk factors in the work processes, the prevalence of body pain among workers, and the relationship between body pain and work processes. A total of 906 women semiconductor workers took part in the study. In wafer preparation and polishing, a combination of lifting weights and prolonged standing might have led to high pain prevalences in the low back (35.0% wafer preparation, 41.7% wafer polishing) and lower limbs (90.0% wafer preparation, 66.7% wafer polishing). Semiconductor front of line workers, who mostly walked around to operate machines in clean rooms, had the lowest prevalences of body pain. Semiconductor assembly middle of line workers, especially the molding workers, who did frequent lifting, had high pain prevalences in the neck/shoulders (54.8%) and upper back (43.5%). In the semiconductor assembly end of line work section, chip inspection workers who were exposed to prolonged sitting without back support had high prevalences of neck/shoulder (62.2%) and upper back pain (50.0%), while chip testing workers who had to climb steps to load units had a high prevalence of lower limb pain (68.0%). Workers in the assembly of electronic components, carrying out repetitive tasks with hands and fingers, and standing in awkward postures had high pain prevalences in the neck/shoulders (61.5%), arms (38.5%), and hands/wrists (30.8%)

A review of international developments in occupational safety and health auditing practices

Auditing is an integral component of the occupational safety and health management system (OSHMS). Why, how and who conducts the OSH audits vary. There are rapid developments in OSH auditing. These are in the context of standardization of the audit mechanism, eg. the development of international guidelines and OSH performance indicators. Criticism has been raised by different professionals in facing both old and new audit approaches occupational safety and health. Malaysia could learn from these experiences in developing the suitable auditing practices. In short, few key areas were learned from the literature review that found important as a good input to local audit practitioners. Firstly, the OSH MS audit should be conducted in the more value added to the organization than just merely conforming to the own disciplinary standard. For instance, OSH audit should incorporate or integrate with other main business functions. Secondly, OSH audit should be adopting more process based performance than just the downstream accident rate measurement. Thirdly, program audit approach should be replace with the system approach so that the real root cause problem could be identified rather then the symptom problem. Forth, there is no right set of OSHMS elements that means any effort to adopt any new standard should be tested thoroughly before blindly adopted it completely. Fifth, audit should go beyond merely comply to the laws and conformance to any standard procedures as well as its rigid definition. Off-job injuries statistic is in fact far more severe compare to the formal workplace injuries rate. Blindly abide to narrow laws definition or standard will result the bigger losses were fail to identify

Emotional Burnout, Perceived Sources of Job Stress, Professional Fulfillment, and Engagement among Medical Residents in Malaysia

This study was the first to explore factors associated with emotional burnout (EB) among medical residents in Malaysia. A cross-sectional study was conducted in a universal sample of 205 medical residents in a Malaysian general hospital. The self-administered questionnaire used consisted of questions on sociodemographics and work characteristics, sources of job stress, professional fulfillment, engagement, and EB. EB was measured using the emotional exhaustion subscale, the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI). Mean (±SD) age of the respondents was 26.5 (±1.6). The most common source of job stress was “fear of making mistakes.” Most of the participants were dissatisfied with the increase of residentship period from one year to two years. A high level of EB was reported by 36.6% of the respondents. In multivariate analysis, the most important correlates of EB were sources of job stress, professional fulfillment, and engagement. A high prevalence of EB was found among medical residents. Sociodemographic characteristics, performance pressure, and satisfaction with policies were significantly associated with EB. Although this study was limited by its cross-sectional design, its findings posit a sufficient foundation to relevant authorities to construct, amend, and amalgamate existing and future policies

Auditory disorders

The following sections are included: Introduction Epidemiology Physics of Sound Hearing Mechanism Effects of Noise Diagnosis Prevention of NIHL: Hearing Conservation Programs Recent Developments Conclusion Reference

Validity and Reliability of Malay Version Physical Activity (BPA) Questionnaire among Nurses.

Introduction: Physical activity reduces risk of non-communicable diseases. Physical activity prevalence is low due to barriers to physical activity. This study was conducted to translate the Barrier to Physical Activity (BPA) questionnaire into Malay and assess the reliability and validity of the translated version among nurses. Methods: The Malay version of BPA was developed after translating the English version of BPA through back to back translation process. The Malay BPA was distributed among 306 volunteered nurses from 5 government hospitals in Selangor state. Factor analysis, Cronbach’s alpha test and test – retest reliability was conducted to determine psychometric properties of BPA. Results: Chronbach’s alpha coefficient was 0.79 for perceived benefits items and 0.51 for perceived barrier items (overall was 0.73). The ICC was 0.88 (95% CI: 0.78-0.93) for test-retest testing after 7 days. Two factors components were yielded through exploratory factor analysis with eigenvalues of 3.9 and 2.0 respectively. Both the factors accounts for 31.4 % of the variance. Factor 1 included 14 items and explained 19.9% of the variance. Factor 2 consisted of 5 items and explained 11.5% of variance. CFA yielded two factor structures with acceptable goodness of fit indices [x2/df = 23.99; GFI = 0.82, SRMR = 0.09; PNFI = 0.49 and RMSEA = 0.10 (90%CI = 0.09-0.11)]. Conclusions: The Malay version of BPA had demonstrated satisfactory level of validity and reliability to assess barriers to physical activity. Therefore, this questionnaire is valid in assessing barriers to physical activity among working population

Field Report Ergonomic Risk Factors of Work Processes in the Semiconductor Industry in Peninsular Malaysia

Abstract: A cross-sectional survey of semiconductor factories was conducted to identify the ergonomic risk factors in the work processes, the prevalence of body pain among workers, and the relationship between body pain and work processes. A total of 906 women semiconductor workers took part in the study. In wafer preparation and polishing, a combination of lifting weights and prolonged standing might have led to high pain prevalences in the low back (35.0 % wafer preparation, 41.7 % wafer polishing) and lower limbs (90.0 % wafer preparation, 66.7 % wafer polishing). Semiconductor front of line workers, who mostly walked around to operate machines in clean rooms, had the lowest prevalences of body pain. Semiconductor assembly middle of line workers, especially the molding workers, who did frequent lifting, had high pain prevalences in the neck/shoulders (54.8%) and upper back (43.5%). In the semiconductor assembly end of line work section, chip inspection workers who were exposed to prolonged sitting without back support had high prevalences of neck/shoulder (62.2%) and upper back pain (50.0%), while chip testing workers who had to climb steps to load units had a high prevalence of lower limb pain (68.0%). Workers in the assembly of electronic components, carrying out repetitive tasks with hands and fingers, and standing in awkward postures had high pain prevalences in the neck/shoulders (61.5%), arms (38.5%), and hands/wrists (30.8%)

Strengths and weaknesses of occupational safety and health's audit system in a manufacturing plant in Selangor

Occupational Safety and Health Management System (OSHMS) has been introduced in many workplaces. Audit is also an integral component of an occupational safety and health system. A study was conducted to gain understanding of the weaknesses and strengths of OSH audit practice as perceived by three different target groups, namely safety and health officers (SHO), employer's representative (EMR) and employee's representative (EME). The research method involved an in-depth interview in a local Japanese Manufacturing Firm. Concerning the weaknesses of audit practice, SHOs indicated that operators were overloaded with too many audit activities and audit merely based on compliance to laws which are not enough. Whereas the employee representative felt the operator should be more involved in audit activities and audit findings were slow to reach the operators. Employer representative found that audits hardly changed the worker attitudes and auditors should not be fault finding and must work together with concern section in problem solving. Among the strengths of the audit system, SHOs commented that the written audit policy helped workers in better understanding of its purposes. Job rotation provided a good training for auditor to become competent. Employee representatives felt that it helped to raise safety awareness among operator and good feedback to them. Lastly,the employer representatives found that the audit practice helped to raise worker understanding on safety matters and auditors were able to notify the hidden safety problems that operator had difficulty to detect. In conclusion, from the preliminary study of a long good track record of OSH audit system in 2 Japanese manufacturing firm, it shows the general perception towards audit approach as the best approach to identify OSH weakness still receiving some contradict ideas from the various groups especially the EMR and EME as well. It implies that there is still room for improving the audit approach